Liquid discharging head, liquid discharging unit, and device to discharge liquid

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9561655-B2
Application number	US-201614996569-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jan 15, 2016
Priority date	Jan 16, 2015
Publication date	Feb 7, 2017
Grant date	Feb 7, 2017

Abstract

A liquid discharging head includes a nozzle plate including a nozzle substrate having a plurality of nozzle holes to discharge a liquid therethrough and a plurality of dimples on the discharging surface of the nozzle substrate to hold a liquid repellent material inside the plurality of dimples in a flowable manner and a liquid repellency film formed by the liquid repellent material on the discharging surface of the nozzle substrate.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A liquid discharging head comprising:
a nozzle plate including:
a nozzle substrate having a plurality of nozzle holes to discharge a liquid through the nozzle holes and a plurality of dimples on a discharging surface of the nozzle substrate; and
a liquid repellency film formed of a liquid repellent material on the discharging surface of the nozzle substrate,

wherein the liquid repellent material is held in a flowable state inside the plurality of dimples, and
wherein a diameter of said dimples is in a range of 80 μm to 120 μm and is larger than a diameter of said nozzle holes.

2. The liquid discharging head according to claim 1 , wherein the liquid repellent material is a compound having a perfluoropolyether (PFPE) skeleton in a molecule thereof.

3. The liquid discharging head according to claim 1 , wherein the dimples are formed on an area distanced from the nozzle holes with a length.

4. The liquid discharging head according to claim 3 , wherein the length is 150 μm.

5. The liquid discharging head according to claim 1 , wherein the discharging surface of the nozzle substrate has a base coat film as a base coat of the liquid repellent film.

6. A liquid discharging unit comprising:
the liquid discharging head of claim 1 .

7. The liquid discharging unit according to claim 6 , wherein the liquid discharging head is integrated with at least one of a head tank to store a liquid to be supplied to the liquid discharging head, a carriage to carry the liquid discharging head, a supplying mechanism to supply the liquid to the liquid discharging head, a maintenance and recovery mechanism to maintain and recover the liquid discharging head, or a main scanning moving mechanism to move the liquid discharging head in a main scanning direction.

8. A device to discharge a liquid comprising:
the liquid discharging head of claim 1 .

9. A device to discharge a liquid comprising:
the liquid discharging unit of claim 6 .

10. The liquid discharging head according to claim 1 , wherein
the nozzle substrate includes four nozzle lines formed thereon, including two inner nozzle lines sandwiched by two outer nozzle lines, each nozzle line including multiple nozzle holes arranged in a nozzle arrangement direction, and
a distance, in a line arrangement direction intersecting the nozzle alignment direction, between the inner nozzle lines is greater than a distance between each inner nozzle line and an outer nozzle line adjacent to said inner nozzle line.

11. The liquid discharging head according to claim 1 , wherein
one or more dimples are disposed between the inner nozzle lines.

Assignees

• Tamai Tomohiro
• Tokuno Toshiroh
• Ricoh Co Ltd

Inventors

• Tamai Tomohiro
• Tokuno Toshiroh

Classifications

• B41J2/1623

  bonding and adhesion · CPC title

• B41J2/162

  Manufacturing of the nozzle plates · CPC title

• B41J2/14274

  of stacked structure type, deformed by compression/extension and disposed on a diaphragm · CPC title

• B41J2/1606

  Coating the nozzle area or the ink chamber · CPC title

• B41J2/1433 Primary

  Structure of nozzle plates · CPC title